I am not a fan of spice blends picked up from the supermarket shelves. I would rather have individual spices in my pantry. Each brand has its own distinctive taste, actually making it difficult to like one. The only masala powder I pick up is the chaat masala and then on and off, a pack of Madras curry powder. I am not sure why I pick it up, but I love that smoky smell the spice mix gives when you open the dabba. Unlike most of the curry powders which are in a plastic pack sealed inside a box pack. the Madras curry powder always comes in a tin. I have read somewhere that they use this curry powder a lot in Emirati cooking, likely due to the influence of South Indian cooking on the local cuisine here. With the current batch I have, I used them in the…
Bull’s Eye Egg Curry | Potticha Mutta Curry
There is a reason why I specifically chose “Bring on the Curry” as the theme for this week’s Blogging Marathon #114. During the lock down period, my SIL and I would break our head thinking what to try for dinner. It is a multi-million dollar question all the time, isn’t it? Like many, a lot of my time goes trying to decide what to cook instead of the actual cooking. It was then I discovered umma’s notebook while rearranging my kitchen shelves. She had noted down some recipes that she had seen on TV and actually had cooked them a couple of times. I have already tried a few recipes from the book, and this is one of them. Many more will come in due course, InShaAllah… I always wish I am a bit more organized with food plans. Umma used to be like that. She had a…
Mixed Vegetable Sagu | Karnataka Style Vegetable Stew
For this week’s Blogging Marathon #114, when Valli published the themes and I saw “Bring on The Curry!”, I picked it up right away. I struggle with making curries especially for dinner. For lunch, we have a standard rice-curry-fish-stir fry combo, that is still manageable, but for dinner, to keep the folk’s interest, it is a tough task. Anything non-veg gets accepted with gusto but when it comes to vegetarian fare, I have a roller coaster ride. I guess anybody with a carnivorous family would agree to this. So you can imagine my excitement, when I made this sagu and it got wiped up from the plate. Such a joyous moment! A sagu is a rich gravy that is very specially made in Karnataka, usually eaten with set dosa or pooris. When you go through the list of ingredients, you may figure out the richness. The coconut and…
Kalonji Aloo | Potatoes with Nigella Seeds
The current pandemic had put a temporary stop to a few challenges and that included the AtoZ Challenge, that is hosted by Vidya and Jolly. After posting this recipe for the letter “M”, the tough times came through and taking into account the lock-down back home and non-availability of ingredients, the post for the letter “N” was moved. Finally, we had a declaration from Vidya that we could do our posts this month. During this pandemic, I decided I would cook up with what I had in my pantry – “Nigella Seeds” aka kalonji. This ingredient is actually something I rarely use in my cooking. I keep a little stock in my pantry so that I can sprinkle it into my pazhampori. I totally love the little bitterness it gives when you bite through it along with the sweet plantains. My impulse was to try Fami’s banana bread, but…
Aloo Baingan | Potatoes with Brinjal
Even though I have a lot of curry recipes already on the blog, somehow my mind always rotates around my sister’s complaint that I don’t have many “serious” recipes. I still fail to understand what she means by it. Hehe… With the last couple of months teaching a lot about the management of time and resources, it has become really important to learn to cook with whatever is available in the pantry. Alhamdulillah, we never faced a situation where we were short on anything. We still could order online and recieve stocks, we could move out and get the grocery we wanted, but I do know of a lot of friends and acquaintances who stayed in complete lockdown areas and had to adjust with whatever they had with them, and with no option of getting in any deliveries. I never knew that a combination of potatoes and brinjals…
Batata Batemjaan ~ Potato Aubergine Casserole
I was contemplating whether to post this now or later. But during Ramadan, even though we love to eat a lot of non-veg dishes, there are times when you would like vegetarian fare and you would prefer eating something that wouldn’t make you miss non-vegetarian food. This casserole perfectly fits the bill in every way. Let me start with a story. Last January when my parents were here, we were invited for dinner to HD’s local friend’s sister’s house. It is the first time I am eating at a local’s house. Expats in the Gulf countries may understand when I say “first time”. I do have a couple of local friends but we always end up meeting and eating out. The beauty of most of the Gulf countries is you do not feel like you are living in a foreign country, especially if you are an Indian, and…
Aloo Gobhi | Easy Cauliflower Potato Curry {Version 2}
How’s the current lockdown treating you all? With Ramadan right across the corner expected anytime on Thursday or for sure on Friday, it feels really different. We have already received notifications that the masjids would continue to remain closed, so all prayers would still be at home. Even though I have been pryaing Tharaweeh at home ever since the girls came their way, I always love going to the masjid for the Tharaweeh. It gives a real Ramadan feeling. For the past couple of years, even though not every day, I would go on and off whenever I have been able to settle up work. But this time, there is no hope. Let us wait and see how things fare as days pass by, InShaAllah… I am all in for gravies that don’t need too much work. I already have a version on the blog, which umma loves…
Dry Chicken Curry
Is there a dearth of chicken curry recipes? Surely not! I already have so many on the blog, and there are many many more that I have tried and are waiting to come up. Hehe… Why I decide to post them, is mainly because they taste different from each recipe I have tried despite having similar ingredients with just a small change in the cooking technique. That is surely an amazing characteristic when it comes to cooking. So after the Borani Banjan, here is a chicken curry that has a thick sauce and goes absolutely well with simple bread, chapathis or paratha, or a side to any dry flavorful rice like this coconut milk rice or masala choru. I have adapted this recipe from a cut-out I had pasted into my scrap book. I better not dwell around my cut-outs! There are so many of them that I…
Borani Banjan | Baingan ka Borani ~ Afghani Eggplant Yogurt Dish
Ever since the work-from-home has started, I have been trying a lot of new curry recipes that are easy to cook and are budget friendly. I am sure many of us have been doing this a lot. We buy vegetables for ten days and stretch whatever we have and utilize everything we have. Since it is slowly moving into summers, the chance of spoilage is high so it becomes even more imperative to cook everything and finish, before it lands up in trash. I have been noticing that a lot of my curry recipes and easy baking recipes have been doing extremely well, and hence I thought, why not share three back-to-back easy curry recipes that all of you can incorporate into your daily cooking, or maybe as a different menu, but with pantry ingredients. So let me start off with this Borani Baingan… I am sure like…
Restaurant Style Chilli Chicken
I mentioned I had guests in my last post. They left for home on Saturday and reached safely, Alhamdulillah. One amongst them was HD’s uncle, who had taken care of him when his parents passed away young. He owns a successful restaurant in an outskirt in Salalah, which is well known for its rotisserie chicken. He loves to cook once in a while, and when we are back home, he would get into the kitchen to fry fresh fish that he would get and come or make this delicious chilli chicken of his. The first time I tasted it was when he came on visit a couple of years ago. He asked HD to get one rotisserie chicken and asked me to slice the onions and tomatoes for him. The speed at which he made this dish was amazing, despite being an unknown kitchen for him. We mopped it…
Meen Thengapaalil Vevichathu ~ Alapuzha Fish Curry with Coconut Milk
Even though I have a huge cookbook collection, I have literally stopped going through it, or even flipping through it. I have gone through these bouts of addictive behavior, where I would hoard stuff, and then all of a sudden, just stop. Once upon a time, I used to hoard bags, and then I gave off all mine and retained just what I like. Then I would hoard watches. Even in those, I gave off those I got bored off and continue to use some that I really love. There was a time I wouldn’t come home without buying a new pair of sandals or shoes. I have outgrown that stage. When I started blogging, my focus went onto props. I have props hidden in every corner of the house, that I do not know where to start cleaning and disposing from. It was during the same time I…
Aloo Gosht ~ Meat and Potato Curry
After posting the Batata Harra and Aloo Raita, here is the final potato recipe for this week’s Blogging Marathon #106 theme of “Pick one vegetable, cook dishes from three states/countries”. I have moved from Lebanon to India and now to our neighboring Pakistan to select a humble potato dish. In fact, this dish is cooked in Muslim heavy areas of northern India as well. My first tryst with Aloo Gosht was at a nearby Pakistani restaurant, adjacent to the building we used to stay during our school days. We would go there for eating their huge thick oil laden parathas and order sides of dal fry and this aloo gosht. It would look the same all the time – a dark brown color gravy with a couple of inches of oil floating on the top, which we used to pull out by dropping a couple of tissue on…
Batata Harra ~ Lebanese Skillet Potatoes
This week, I am doing three posts related to the Blogging Marathon #106 for the theme “Choose a vegetable, prepare three dishes from different states/ countries”. I have no clue why I chose this theme, but I am sure it was with the good intention of making some nice vegetarian dishes for the blog. I first pondered around using eggplant as my ingredient and even mentioned three recipes I would try. Alas, nothing materialized and to make sure that I have posts ready for this week, I went with the easy to work with, world famous tuber called potatoes, which was incidentally Valli’s example for us to explain the theme. 😀 I was supposed to be doing another dish to start off these three weeks. But I skittled through last moment, and realized I only had saved up the pictures of this post in my pen drive. I…
Pressure Cooker Chicken Curry | Easy Chicken Curry
I am wondering how should I start this post. Most of the time, these days my head is really blank. There has been a lot happening – good and ugly and my thoughts are all muddled up in that process, not knowing which way to think and keep my mood. But one thing I know – that what is destined, good or bad, will surely come our way, come what maybe. Sometimes thinking that way makes sense more than becoming tensed about what is going to come. I keep telling HD that we have always been relieved of the tensions we face, so maybe we just need to stay positive and hope that everything will settle, InShaAllah. Having said that, winters are slowly sweeping in and is releasing a very laid back air in all. I find it hard to do anything, forget about cooking. Even though I love…
Kozhi Ishtu ~ Kerala Chicken Stew
For this week’s Blogging Maraton #106 theme of “Soups and Stews”, since the last two posts were soups, I thought I will post a stew this time. A stew usually has more body that soups and eaten with a side of bread, rice or something similar. I just decided that the easiest thing for me to do is to post our own stew – Ishtu, which is basically a “Malayalamized” word of stew. 😀 For umma, ishtu is always vegetarian – with potatoes and some additional vegetables. Whenever we would tell her to add chicken or meat, she would give us such a stare as though we have done some sacrilege. Hehe… However, non-veg ishtu very much exists in the menu card of Keralites. Just like umma, I used to think rasam was always vegetarian till I heard of “kozhi rasam”. Hehe… yet to try though… OK, coming…
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